The naming suggestions in a contest – which ran from last February to April – ranged from the scholarly to the silly, these scientists said. We think you’ll like the winners.

The Hayabusa2 mission has confirmed that – if asteroid Ryugu or a similar asteroid were to come dangerously close to Earth – we’d need to take care in trying to divert it, lest it break up into fragments that might then impact Earth.

Saturday’s heartbreaking loss of contact with the Vikram lander – part of the Chandrayaan-2 mission to the moon – hasn’t changed the upbeat tone of India’s space science. Here’s what we know so far.

The Vikram lander was to have made India the 4th nation of Earth to soft land on the moon. Contact with it was lost just 1.3 miles (2.1 km) above the moon’s surface.

NEOs are near-Earth objects, asteroids and small comets that sweep near Earth and have the potential to cause harm. Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico has, since the 1990s, been finding about 60 to 120 of these objects every year.

It’s been 13 years since astronomers announced Pluto would no longer be considered a major planet in our solar system. When it happened, in 2006, the decision caused a shock wave around the world.

Arecibo in Puerto Rico was completed in 1963. In recent years, it has weathered multiple hurricanes. The emergency supplemental funds – supported by the U.S. Congress – represent an investment in the future of this large, famous and much-loved radio dish.